Conversion Book Two: Bloodlines

by S. C. Stephens

  I immediately relaxed as the relationship to my husband became apparent. Tracey beside me snorted, clearly she didn’t buy that, but I still ignored her. Brightening, I threw on a genuine smile. “Oh, I’ve never met anyone who grew up with him. It’s nice to meet someone from his past.” A part of me was a little surprised this girl even remembered who he was. Didn’t they say that most people would only vaguely remember him? She’d picked up on him by only his first name.

  The woman smiled at me, her face clearly rewinding back into that past. “Yeah, we had some great times. You’re very lucky…he’s a great guy.” She said that last part wistfully and that tension came back to me. Just how had she known my husband? Before I could ask, she added, “Do you live around here?” She looked around like Teren might be here too. I mentally smiled that he was visiting his family at the ranch. Bringing her eyes back to me, she said, “Do you think we could all get together while I’m in town?”

  Relief flooded through me that she didn’t live here. Sighing with a fake reluctance, I said, “I’m not sure. He’s very busy with his work.”

  She brightened at that. “Oh, did he become a writer? He was so brilliant in school.”

  My smile left me that she knew him so well. “Um…yes. He writes for a magazine here.” Not knowing how I felt about meeting this woman, I slapped on a friendly smile, my hand automatically going to my stomach, as yet another child knocked me from the inside. “Well, I’ll be sure to tell him you say hello.” You can be sure of that. I had many questions for that boy.

  She didn’t react to my clear dismissal. Instead her eyes went to my stomach and I swear her face paled. “Are you…is that…?” She looked up at me, her eyes unnecessarily moist. “Are you expecting …Teren’s child?”

  My brows furrowed at the look on her face. I couldn’t even speak. Luckily, or unluckily, Tracey answered for me. “Yep. He knocked her up good…twins. Right around the time they got married.” She stressed married, like she was trying to warn away this could-be home wrecker.

  As the woman’s eyes filled with tears, I still didn’t think that that was what this was about. Her eyes went back to my stomach and as the tears filled to flood level, she hastily brushed them aside. “God, I’m sorry. I’m being so inappropriate today. I just didn’t expect to hear about him again…and here you are…and you’re…” She looked at a smugly smiling Tracey and then to me. “I should go. Congratulations…to both of you.”

  She hastily turned to leave and I reached out and grabbed her hand. She looked back at me, more tears falling, and the sympathetic side of me kicked in. “Are you okay?” Tracey snorted again and I ignored her again. This woman was hurting for some reason, and it couldn’t just be because some boy she’d known in high school had gotten married and started a family.

  She sniffled as she looked back at me, another tear falling, her blue eyes glistening. “I’m sorry. It shouldn’t still affect me after all this time, and we were so young, it really was for the best.” She bit her lip and shrugged. “I guess you just never really get over that kind of loss.” She shook her head, more tears falling.

  She was really starting to lose it and I had no idea why. Then her words started filling in my head, and over the music piping through the room, I started to piece together what she meant. Loss. She didn’t mean losing Teren. She hadn’t seemed much more than curious about him, until she looked at my stomach. That was when pain had brought her to the blubbery mess she was now. Pain, over my pregnancy. Loss…over her own?

  She stared at my stomach, her voice sad and reminiscent. “I wonder if they will have his super dark hair and beautiful pale eyes.” She stopped talking and looked back up at me. “Such a great combination, isn’t it? The darkness and lightness. So perfect.” Her hand went to her stomach in a familiar move, a move I did daily. My eyes widened as I watched her, my suspicions confirmed.

  My mouth dropped wide open. “Were you pregnant?” I whispered.

  She looked terrified, like I might strike her, and backed up a step, pulling apart from me. She looked over at a startled Tracey and then back to me. “God, I’m so inappropriate. I shouldn’t be bringing this up with you.” She shook her head and started to leave. “Please, tell Teren hello. It was nice to meet you.”

  She turned to leave again and I stood up quickly. Well, as quickly as I could get out of the throne room-like chair. Tracey understood, and helped me to stand up quicker. The woman paused as I desperately grabbed her arm again. “Please,” I begged. “I need to know. Did Teren get you pregnant?”

  She sighed, looking horribly apologetic. “It was a long time ago. Please don’t be angry.” She shrugged off my hand and took a quick step back. “I’m so sorry I said anything.” She looked at my stomach again. “You just…surprised me. Brought back a lot of…memories.” Backing up another step, she muttered, “Please, give Teren my best.”

  I only nodded. I planned on giving Teren my best as well. I couldn’t even comprehend the fact that this woman vividly remembered him, right down to the hair and eyes and the fact that he loved to write. Her admission over what their relationship had been was so beyond startling, that I was a little numb from it, and Tracey had to physically help me walk to my car, for fear I might pass out at any moment. I wasn’t the first woman to have Teren Adams’ seed growing inside her. I felt like my world had just shattered.

  I managed to separate from Tracey after we left that fateful coffee shop, convincing her that I was fine, and it was in Teren’s past and didn’t concern me in the slightest. She eventually bought that, and left in her own car to go home and visit Hot Ben, maybe now even more concerned over what he may be hiding from her.

  I couldn’t worry about them any longer, as the hole punched through my gut started to ache. He’d gotten someone pregnant and never once mentioned it. You would think that was the sort of thing he’d mention while we were trying. And what happened to the baby anyway? Carrie had only mentioned loss. She never actually said what kind of loss. Did she not make it through the full pregnancy or did she give the baby up? I couldn’t imagine Teren’s family letting an heir go, so I tended to think it was the first part. She’d lost the baby. Willingly or unwillingly? How far along? While they were in school? How often had they had sex to get her pregnant?

  As I automatically started driving to the ranch to confront my husband, that’s the direction my mind went. I knew I shouldn’t, I mean, neither one of us were virgins going into this relationship, and I’d had my fair share of dalliances, but as I sped along that highway, the only thing running through my head was the various positions he and that woman had possibly been engaged in. I pictured them in her car in the school parking lot, under the bleachers during a pep rally, and even up against the wall in the girl’s locker room. I doubted any of those scenarios had actually happened, but I pictured them anyway. I also wondered if I’d just met Teren’s “first”. My stomach felt sour by the time I got to the ranch.

  Alanna greeted me at the door, opening it right as I walked up – she could now sense me too, since the blood in my babies was a homing beacon to all the vamps. She smiled widely at seeing me. “Emma, I didn’t think you’d be by today.” She cocked her head as I strode into the entryway. “Are you alright, dear?” She could probably hear my hammering heart.

  “Where is he?” I bit out through clenched teeth.

  She looked over her shoulder to a place outside, where he must be with Jack. “He’s coming. He sensed you approaching.”

  I nodded and started pacing the room, my fists clenched tight. Alanna stopped me, putting a hand on my shoulder. “What is it, Emma?”

  I started to answer her, to ask her if she knew about any of this, and how could she not tell me, and what else did she know, when suddenly Teren breezed into the room. His pale eyes took in my body language - my heart, my smell, my stance – everything about me was pissed off. He scrunched his brows as he walked over to me, his cool fingers coming to my cheeks while his eyes looked for clues. “W
hat happened?”

  Grabbing his hands and pulling them off my face, I clenched his fingers in mine. He made no indication that I was hurting him, which I probably wasn’t. “I met someone today, someone who knows you…very well.” I said it calmly, but an undercurrent of seething anger was there, and he sensed it.

  His body stiffened as he searched me. “Okay,” he said slowly, his face horribly confused as to why I was such a different person than the woman he had tenderly made love to, just this morning.

  Remembering all of the intimate moments we had shared, and unfairly mixing them with all of the intimate moments I’d imagined him having with another woman on the drive over, I shoved his chest away from me. He took a step back, looking hurt. “Carrie,” was all I said, seeing if he’d instinctually know what I was talking about.

  I glanced at Alanna, but she looked hopelessly lost. That made me feel a little better. Maybe I wasn’t alone in my ignorance. Teren looked hopelessly lost too…at first. “Carr-” His eyes widened and I knew the exact moment he realized he’d just been busted. “Oh god, Emma.” He shook his head and walked over to me, putting his hands on my upper arms. “I can explain.”

  I shoved him away from me again, as if he’d just confirmed every intimate act that I’d imagined of them. “You can explain getting another woman pregnant!” Teren took a step back, a hand going up to his mouth while the other ran back through his hair.

  “What? Teren?” Alanna came over to stand beside me, her cool hand over my arm as she stared incredulously at her son. I put my hand over hers, grateful that not everyone had kept this secret from me, just my husband apparently. Jack walked into the room, now filled with a horrid tension, and stood still in the hallway that led to the kitchen. He looked between me, his wife and his son, and seemed unsure if he should stay or not. As I was still fuming, I really didn’t care which choice he made.

  Teren looked at his mother when she questioned him, then upstairs to where Imogen was probably questioning him too. Keeping his eyes up there he finally said, “I’ll explain.” He brought his panicked eyes back down to me. “Just let me explain.”

  I crossed my arms over my chest and nodded. I wanted to tap my foot too, but felt that was a little dramatic, so I stood as still and rigid as I possibly could. Teren made a move towards me, but seeing my clear tension, sighed and stopped where he was, next to the crying woman statue. His face sort of matched hers.

  “We were young, Emma, just kids.” He shrugged and glanced at his mother before returning his eyes to mine. “We dated a few months and then…she got pregnant.” He whispered the word, like him saying it out loud was somehow more horrid than me yelling it. And in a way, it was. I cringed as the words left his lips. I bit my own to keep back the tears stinging my eyes. He took in my turmoil and sighed. “She lost it, Emma. She didn’t even make it eight weeks before she miscarried.” He shrugged his shoulders. “There is no baby.”

  My arms crossed over my chest flew to my sides, my hands clenched so tight my fingernails dug into my palms. “Why did you never mention this to me?”

  He shrugged again, his face looking sad and unsure what to say. Shaking his head, he repeated, “There is no baby.”

  I looked away from him as my anger ebbed and surged. I couldn’t control the waves of emotion and looking at his torn face was only making the sensation worse. I needed to ride out this tidal wave of anger before speaking again, or I may try and tear off that secretive mouth.

  Alanna took my silence to speak to her son. “Carrie?” she said slowly, stepping up to him. “Who is Carrie?” I turned to watch her as she walked up to him, hands on her hips.

  He sighed, looking up at the ceiling and closing his eyes for a second, looking for all the world like he was about to have a conversation that he had never intended to have with his family. He opened his eyes and looked back down at her. “We dated in high school.”

  Alanna scrunched her brows. “I don’t remember a Carrie in high school. I don’t remember you being serious with anyone, not until college.”

  Teren looked at the ground while Jack stepped up to his wife’s side, grabbing one hand from her hip and holding it. Her entire posture relaxed. Without looking up at her, Teren said, “I didn’t tell you about her. I didn’t want any of you to know.”

  Alanna looked like Teren had just slapped her. He guiltily looked up at her and spoke a long Russian sentence. Her face turned mildly softer and she shook her head and put a hand on his cheek.

  Irritated that her irritation was leaving her, I spat out, “You should have told me, Teren.”

  His eyes came back to mine. “I know, I’m sorry.”

  Alanna turned to look at me, her eyes pink with unshed tears. “You saw her today? In town?”

  I nodded. “She’s visiting or something. She won’t be here long, but she wanted to see Teren once she found out he was here.” My eyes shifted to him as my tone dripped with venom. “She says hi, by the way.”

  He closed his eyes at that but opened them immediately when Alanna spoke again. “We’ll need to tell Halina, she’ll want to see the girl.”

  “No!”

  The heat in Teren’s tone when he said that shocked Alanna and me. We both turned to look at him, his dad giving him a puzzled look as well. “Teren, she can’t be allowed to know-”

  Teren shook his head and grabbed his mother’s arms, cutting her off. “She doesn’t know. She never found out.”

  Alanna raised an eyebrow at him, surprised. “You didn’t tell her what you were, when she got pregnant?”

  He shook his head again and anger surged through me at hearing that stupid p-word again. “I thought you wouldn’t bring anyone into this unknowingly. Isn’t that what you said to me?”

  He cringed and stepped away from his mother to finally step up to me again. Cautiously he put his hands over my arms, sliding them all the way down to my fingers, trying to relax me. All it did though was remind me that he’d probably slid his hands down that woman’s arms in this exact same way, comforting her when she realized she was with child - his child. I bristled at the contact and he sighed.

  “She’s why, Emma.” He stepped up to me and my belly brushed his stomach. He clenched my hands as he spoke softly. “When she found out, I realized how dangerous what we’d just done really was. She was the only one that I wasn’t cautious with. She was the only one that I didn’t make sure one of us was protected. And I just couldn’t tell her what she was really carrying. If she had given birth…” He sighed and rested his head against mine. “I was sixteen, Emma. I was stupid…please don’t hate me for that.”

  I started shaking as I held in my conflicting emotions. Anger still boiled in me, but so did understanding and compassion. Lord knows I hadn’t made the smartest choices, especially at sixteen. I’d just managed to dodge the proverbial bullet. Teren hadn’t been so lucky, and it had certainly woken him up as to how hard relationships were going to be for him. Even the first few times we were together, he’d been diligent about protection. Come to think of it, he’d been diligent until the day he watched me pop a pill. Feeling the truth in the hard lesson he’d learned, I relaxed slightly in his grip, finally letting his fingers interlace mine. He sighed again and rocked his head against me as he whispered that he was sorry.

  Alanna came up to him, resting a hand on his back. “You should have told us, Teren.”

  He looked back at her, his eyes sad. “It didn’t matter. She didn’t know and she lost the baby.” He shrugged, looking like a sixteen year old that had just gotten caught doing something really stupid.

  Alanna shook her head at him. “No, you should have told us, so you wouldn’t have had to go through that alone. We can’t start lying to each other, Teren. We’re all we have. We need to be honest. Here, if nowhere else, we need to be honest.”

  He swallowed and looked down, a tear finally dropping to his cheek. “I’m sorry, Mom. I just…I wanted her left alone.” He looked up at her. “It was hard, not to tell you
, but I wanted her…to remember.” He spoke another Russian sentence to her and Alanna sighed heavily and lowered her hand from his back.

  “I have to tell Halina, Teren. I can’t keep something this big from her and mother won’t.” Her eyes drifted upstairs to where Imogen was hiding out the sunshine in her room. I thought that if there were more curtains in the entryway, Imogen would be right down in the middle of this conversation, putting in her two cents worth. As both vampires still had their head turned to the upstairs room, I thought maybe she was anyway.

  Teren started shaking his head as he looked back down at his mom. “Just give it a few days. Emma said she was only visiting, just wait until she’s left town before you tell Great-Gran. Please?”

  Teren’s hands tightened in mine as he begged for his ex-girlfriend’s memory. Thinking back to her tears in the coffee shop over their lost child, I had no idea why he wanted her to remember that tragic event. Alanna seemed equally as confused as she looked at him.